Micheline Charest, co-founder of Canada's award-winning but scandal-plagued children's television producer Cinar Corp., died Wednesday at a Montreal hospital of complications from plastic surgery. She was 51.
Charest's death came a day after she was rushed to the emergency ward from a nearby plastic surgery clinic, where she had undergone procedures that a former colleague described as routine. An autopsy was performed Thursday, but the results were not immediately released.
"The end of Micheline Charest is as tragic as the end of Cinar," said Louise Sansregret, a vice president of the company from 1998 to 2002. Charest co-founded Cinar with her husband, Ronald Weinberg, in 1976. Under their leadership, the Montreal-based firm became an entertainment powerhouse in children's television. Its hits included Emmy Award-winning "Arthur" and "Zoboomafoo," top-rated "Wimzie's House," "Caillou" and "The Adventures of Paddington Bear."
In 1997, the Hollywood Reporter ranked the blunt-spoken Charest as the 19th most powerful woman in the U.S. entertainment industry, ahead of talk show host Rosie O'Donnell and singer Madonna.
Cinar was then a stock market darling, worth more than $1 billion. But the financial fairy tale was about to turn into an investor's nightmare.
The company came under investigation in 1999 over allegations that it fraudulently obtained Canadian tax credits by listing Canadians as authors of productions actually written by U.S. citizens.
Cinar's board ousted Charest and Weinberg six months later, after discovering that $122 million had been funneled without board authorization to a Bahamian investment firm.
Cinar stock crashed before being delisted from Nasdaq and the Toronto Stock Exchange, and disgruntled shareholders launched a flurry of class-action lawsuits. Cinar sued Charest and Weinberg, and the couple counter-sued.
Stymied by the scandal, Cinar saw its prospects for lining up new hit programs quickly dwindle, pushing the company into deep losses. The Canadian government stopped the flow of public funds to Cinar, and morale within the company's creative production staff sank.
In 2002, Charest and Weinberg were each fined $750,000 by the Quebec Securities Commission but they never admitted any guilt. Police investigations wound down without criminal charges being filed.
Cinar was sold in February to a group of Toronto-based investors for $144 million. Charest and Weinberg pocketed $18 million on the sale.
